


god of love

by zealotarchaeologist



Category: Chainsaw Man (Manga)
Genre: Domestic, Emotional Manipulation, F/F, Frenemies with Benefits, Implied Sexual Content, Just gals being pals, Pre-Canon, canon-typical fuckedupness, its pretty mild though. only weird thing is fingers in eye hole
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-14 15:01:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29669055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zealotarchaeologist/pseuds/zealotarchaeologist
Summary: on love, dogs, eating, and makima's forearms.
Relationships: Makima/Quanxi (Chainsaw Man)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 34





	god of love

**Author's Note:**

> im manifesting quanxi backstory in part 2

Makima’s homes are always immaculately designed, each in a different way. Today’s home is, well, homey. A little warmer than the previous one, a little more messy, though deliberately so. And she’s got a new dog, too.

“This place is nice.” Quanxi calls from her place on the couch. It’s been a while since she’s been to Japan. She didn’t even know Makima had moved again until today.

“Thank you.” Her sleeves are rolled up to chop, her forearms lifted off the board at a primly 30 degree angle. Not even up to her elbows, but that new incongruous inch of exposed skin makes all the difference. It’s crazy, she privately thinks, how such a little thing can make you want someone so much more badly.

She moves like a perfect machine, the knife rocking steadily to dice vegetables. _Ta-ta, ta-ta, ta-ta_ , on beat. Makima doesn’t usually prefer to cook. This is, of course, a tailored performance. Some kind of TV show version of domesticity.

Is that why she enjoys these little visits? No, not exactly. The sex is very good, though that’s not exactly it either. Maybe there’s something affirming about it—the second she steps into this place she can feel the weight of all Makima’s fucking schemes, the layers and layers of power and manipulation and tugging every little thing into place. It’s exhausting just being around her. Really makes Quanxi remember why she’s chosen to live the blissful way she does.

…that, and the sex really is quite good.

One of the dogs (there are only two, back then) noses against her hand. Obedient and lazy, she scratches at a soft ear. Then a quiet _thud_ from the kitchen counter—Makima’s holding the knife vertical, bringing the hilt down on a clove of garlic. _Thud._ It bruises. _Thud._ A body erupting in blood splatter.

“Loud.” Quanxi mutters in vague, unheard complaint, and stands. Walks to the kitchen, the dogs underfoot. They clear out when she comes up behind Makima, touches her arm even though it’s reasonable to assume she might get a knife to the hand for it. She doesn’t. She inhales, Makima’s distinct devil scent easily overpowering the food.

“You’ll spoil your appetite.”

“Don’t care.” And with an easy, placating smile, Makima allows herself to be turned around and backed against the counter.

Being who she is, what she is, Makima doesn’t need people to get on their knees for her. It’s kind of tacky to do so, really. But Quanxi spent a long time practicing the fine art of holding a girl up with nothing but the strength of her neck and her shoulders and her arms and she’s not about to let it go to waste. So she puts her hands on Makima’s waist, lifts her up, and enjoys the meal.

Around 40 minutes later, the pot starts to boil over so they pause. Makima stands on her own two steady legs like it was nothing.

The second course is pretty good, all things considered. Curry and rice. Quanxi isn’t picky. “Brush your teeth before and after,” Makima ordered, which seems a weird line to draw at this point but whatever. She does, with Makima’s toothbrush. One of the dogs headbutts its way into the bathroom.

Quanxi considers herself in the mirror. Doesn’t know what she’s looking for. But she looks good. Makima’s bathroom is full of expensive things. Is this what girls usually like? Maybe she should pick up some nicer soap, now that there are women living with her.

Quanxi wrinkles her nose. It’s weird to think about the girls (there are only two, back then) in Makima’s house. Not because there’s any illusion of exclusivity between them, just…

…though, if she thinks about it, she’s not quite sure who else Makima would be fucking. Not for fun at least, not outside of her plans. This little dinner date is probably also not outside of her plans. Quanxi finds it exhausting, again, but doesn’t particularly mind. Sex is sex.

Quanxi is different from the other people Makima fucks because she has no plans and no sense of shame. To debase herself costs her nothing. There’s no game in getting her to do anything—unless Makima wants there to be, but playing that out isn’t really her forte.

 _People,_ she thinks, _are so damn weird about sex._

“You’ve been in there a long time.” Makima’s voice, down the hallway. The dog bounds back to its master.

“Had something in my teeth.” Quanxi steps out of the bathroom and pulls her shirt off with absolutely no ceremony. “Up for another round?”

Maybe it’s because of earlier, but she can’t stop thinking about Makima’s forearms. It’s usually fingers that she fixates on. Just today for some reason she keeps mouthing at the bones of Makima’s wrist. Keeps letting her teeth scrape, gently, across the delicate underside of her arm. Her skin is exquisitely soft.

They’re sprawled out on the couch, side by side, ostensibly to catch their bearings and recover a little. _How’s work_ , Quanxi had asked, not really caring about the answer, and listened to Makima talk vaguely in that hypnotic voice of hers. Apparently unbothered by Quanxi’s mouth all over her arm.

Well, it’s not new information that they’re both weird.

“What about you?” Makima asks. Her free hand leaves Quanxi’s vision, sets to tracing around her eyepatch and thus the border of the empty hole beneath. “I heard you’ve picked up some dogs of your own. There was quite the fuss over it.”

Quanxi releases the treasured arm. Makima dabs at the bite marks with her sleeves, bemused. “Not dogs. Girls.”

“Is there such a difference?”

“Absolutely yes.”

“Hm.”

She thinks of Long and Pingtsi, at home right now, curled up on her bed. They might not always get along, but in her absence they will have taken care of each other. They’re probably tucked together under the nice blankets—Long is always greedy for body heat. Ugh, even just the mental image is _so_ cute. She likes thinking about it a lot, her girls in the absence of her.

“I love them.”

It comes out without much thought, which is how she prefers to speak. Though Quanxi does understand it’s dangerous, rolling over like that for Makima.

“I love my dogs.”

“Not the same.” The vague pressure of fingers at the edge of her eye socket. She doesn’t mind. It feels good, in a weird and distant way. “They’re yours, right? Dogs, people?”

Makima smiles. “Yes. My dogs.”

“You don’t belong to them, though.”

“In a way, I do. I’m _their_ master.”

“Well, exactly. You’re not the same thing to each other.”

“You’re not making a very good argument.”

Quanxi shrugs. “I don’t give it much thought.” There’s just no point to doing so. She knows what she feels. Driving herself crazy over what it all means is pointless. Quanxi loves, in her way, and she loves loving, and that’s all she needs.

She lifts her hand just enough to point at one of them, a big, fluffy thing with a triangular face, napping peacefully on the floor. It looks a bit like Long. “Say I kill this animal right now. I’m quicker and you couldn’t stop me.”

“Well, I’d be sad, of course.” Which might be true, but could just as well be a breezily told lie. Makima is Makima, after all. “I’d be unhappy with you for doing something so petty and mean.”

“Would you kill me?”

Makima’s right hand slides down her stomach, finds home between her thighs. She never bothered to put her underwear back on. “Maybe. It depends. There would have to be some negative reinforcement.”

“If my girls died, I would think of nothing but revenge. And then I would probably kill myself.”

“Oh.” Makima flutters her lashes.

Yes, she does understand it’s dangerous to say something like that, showing Makima her neck and handing her the knife. But it’s a lot less effort to be honest than to plot and scheme and try to hide from her. The less she knows about Makima’s plans and her own place in them, the happier she’ll be.

It might be the better position, in the end. Makima likes the process, likes being cloying or cruel to her pets. The best thing for it is not to play. There will be a time when they both understand each other more, when she’s a little stronger, when she finally and firmly sees Quanxi as inferior to her and that will seal the deal. But it’s not even necessary. She doesn’t need to do that. She could just ask. Why would Quanxi want to fight it?

Makima’s fingers push in, both hands at once. Her left one finds the arrow’s shaft. Pulls it out just a little. Pushes it back in.

“You want it like that?” Quanxi asks, though they almost always end up doing this towards the end of the night. “I can hunt you if you like.”

“You let me win too often.” Pull out. Push in. Like everything about Makima, her rhythm is hypnotic. “And I don’t want you making a mess of my new place.”

“Fair enough.”

Makima’s fingers curl around the shaft of the arrow. Makima’s fingers curl… “So try not to move too much or you’ll rip up the couch. Be a good girl for me.”

She pulls the arrow out.

The taste of Makima’s blood lingers insistently in her mouth. At this point, there’s barely any part of this girl that Quanxi hasn’t tasted.

Makima’s fingers running over her stomach as she adjusts back into her human body. Makima’s hand tugging her eyepatch back on, tucking her hair behind her ear.

It’s very blatant, even for someone trying not to notice it.

“You don’t have to do this whole routine.” She takes Makima’s hand by the wrist and moves it away. “If you want me to do something, I’ll do it. I don’t need to know why.”

From her place above, Makima considers her. Less like someone looking at a piece of meat and more like examining an interesting, half-crushed bug on the pavement.

“Fine. Bark for me.”

Quanxi woofs, throat a little hoarse still, and licks her arm again. Makima’s clothes are still on, albeit unbuttoned. The sleeve of her shirt is damp with blood from an injury that no longer exists.

“You’re not very good at that.” And then something about the mood lightens as Makima lays down against her chest, her shoulders rising and falling with a cold little laugh.

Quanxi shrugs as best she can in this position. Her will can’t really break so much as bend. Maybe it’s because her heart isn’t only hers to give away.

They stay like that until she starts wanting a smoke, which she announces to the room. Makima never lets her smoke in the house.

Makima sighs like she’s so put-upon and stands. “Go on. I need to do the dishes, anyway.”

“Thanks, honey.” The cigarette is already in her mouth.

Mid-stride, Makima pauses, looking at her with a suddenly appraising eye. “Would you quit?”

“If you asked, sure.” Quanxi isn’t lying. It would be easy, if she asked. “You wouldn’t even need to train me out of it.”

For a moment, they’re silent, sizing each other up. Then,

“Enjoy your cigarette.”

She does.

Makima doesn’t look up when she comes back in. Already bored with her, probably. Quanxi lays down on the floor with the dogs in their beds, just to see how it feels.

Not bad. Pretty cozy. They’re fluffy and warm on either side of her. She closes her eye and lays there for a minute, listening to their breathing. Listening to Makima humming in the kitchen.

She wants to go home.

“I’m heading out.” Quanxi stands without ceremony and shrugs on her coat. Makima doesn’t acknowledge her. Well, this is what makes her a bad dog—it’s not in her nature to beg for a master’s attention. “Tell Kishibe I said hello.”

“Of course. It was lovely having you.” Makima emerges just as she’s nearly out the door, to grace Quanxi with the sight of her once more. Those eyes. That smile. Her hair, just slightly out of place. Her slacks still unbuttoned. Her sleeves rolled up. She doesn’t want to know how much of this is a show for her benefit. She really doesn’t want to know.

Without looking back, Quanxi walks out of the building. It’s a nice, cool night. She lights another cigarette. Thinks about her girls at home in bed. Enjoys the ache across her body.

She’ll head to the airport, now, and catch a flight back home. She’ll buy a box of candy at the terminal, or a stuffed animal, some silly little souvenir to bring back to them.

She might start visiting Makima less and less often, now.


End file.
